Table Talk 2: When Should You Fold Pocket Aces Pre-Flop?

Over Easter weekend I went down to Moe, where I grew up. I had family and friends to visit, and it'd been a while. I was also supposed to visit my tattooist, but that'll have to wait for another day. A story I heard while I was down that way led me to think about the way people play poker, and how much stock you should be putting in big pairs.

My uncle and aunt play a lot of poker. A lot of poker. It's basically their pastime, so whenever they're not at work, one or both of them has the laptop out and is logged into either PokerStars, PartyPoker, or any other poker site you could think of. Either that, or they're down at the pub playing at the Australian Poker League tournaments. Or, they're back at their place, playing back-to-back no-limit hold'em tournaments with 20 regular runners until the sun comes up. Needless to say, that mob really enjoys their poker.

(Before I continue, I gotta say how awesome it was to see such a strong poker community in an area such as Moe. Granted, there's fuck-all else to do there, but it was great to see so many keen players - the pub tournament on Good Friday had about 80 runners! That said, I couldn't get a 7-stud game started for the life of me, but that'll come another day.)

So over the four-day weekend, I easily played at least 40 hours of poker, with a reasonable degree of success. (I say reasonable because I hate tournaments, and/because I'm not good at them. This will change.) Over 40 hours of poker you get to know who the real poker players are. I'd have to say that there are probably four or five solid players who regularly attend the home game my uncle & aunt hold (all things considered, this is a decent number.) Now, when you talk about solid players, you can fit them into two categories:

• The "Lucky" Group. Most high-level pros fit into this group, and a lot of very good players fit in here as well. They're aware that any two cards can make the nuts, and they play to win. These are the Phil Iveys, the Gus Hansens, and the Daniel Negreanus of the poker world. These guys draw a lot, know how to exit a pot cheaply, and know how to extract a lot of your chips when they have the nuts. They might appear "lucky", but they've got the math and card-reading skills to pull it off.
  

• The Bad Beat Sufferers. These are the guys who only play the top 10-15% of hands, and for the most part they're tighter than a duck's arsehole. They play to not lose. Thankfully, they're winning players among low-stakes tables. If they weren't, they'd never come over to your table full of confidence in their "perfect strategy." If you've got one on your table, you can steal his blinds 90% of the time, as he'll only play 10% of his cards. I call them the "bad beat sufferers" because every single one of them has a story about some donkey who rivered him for his whole stack. They suffer badly for this, because they usually commit themselves to the pot and are forced to play great starting hands in marginal situations.
  

I'll give you an example of a "bad beat sufferer": I had a conversation with one guy (we'll call him "Bob") down in Moe who fits into this category, and after a while he told me a story about a no-limit hand he played at Crown. Bob was dealt A-A in late position and watched as the pot was raised and rereaised. By the time it had come around to him, there were four runners, and three were all-in. There was about $1,100 in the pot, and Bob looked at his bullets and decided to play. When the flop came down suited, but with no rags, he went all-in, essentially forcing the remaining player all-in for another $400.

Bob then watched as people turned over their cards: K-K was there; there was an Ace in somebody else's hand, and a couple of completely rag hands that had no business being there. The guy Bob forced all-in had 6-2 offsuit, and caught a flush on the river. Bob was pissed.

So, to recap: Bob had called pre-flop for about $270, and got 4-1 against his Aces. Now here's the thing about A-A: when you've got 4 runners, you need to knock the bastards out of the pot to get it heads-up (three-handed at the worst). If you can't do that, you've gotta hit trips or a flush and hope nobody hits their flush or straight. Against 4 runners with completely random cards, you're probably getting pot odds to call, but I just don't like the idea of racing Aces when you're not likely to win. To make matters worse, it turns out that when he went all-in he gave the 6-2 guy 4.5-1 odds to make his flush. And Bob didn't even have a flush Ace!

I told him he should have avoided the hand altogether, because it was more likely than not he would be outdrawn. But Bob's a Bad Beat Sufferer, and they're greatest weakness is that because they play fuck-all hands, they're essentially married to anything decent. Then they vehemently defend their play with "I had Aces!" These are the same guys you hear about who "never win with Aces", and "are so damn unlucky" that it makes you wonder why they even play in the first place.

Conversely, I doubt a "lucky" player would have touched that hand. A "lucky" player doesn't have to take a stand like that, and even if he does, he's probably got the stack to handle losing and he'd do it for the pot odds. A "lucky" player will also have the kind of table image that discourages the kind of scenario you just read. Granted, you'll get a lot of action as a loose-aggressive player, but when you're in late position, you'll get limpers and folders to you, because you're too wild for 4 people to push pre-flop on you.

So I guess the moral of the story is that it's better to gamble often with smaller bets than once with your entire stack. Bob wouldn't have a bar of it, but he couldn't logically justify the play. I'd like to hear from you - please let me know if there's something I've missed.

Table Talk 1: Don't Stop at Hold'em

Over the last few weeks, I've been teaching my housemates how to play poker. It started when I began making more frequent (and more profitable) visits to the Crown Poker Room. Since I'm a fairly open book, my mates tend to know when I'm doing something interesting, and if it catches their eye, I've got a rockin' convoy!

However, I've realised - not just from my housemates, but from many people - that Texas Hold'em is the only game they actually want to learn. Why? Either because it's the only version of the game they know to exist (although many people are familiar with Five-Card Draw), or because they've seen it on TV and figure that if they're going to play, they want to play the game the pros play.

If I've just described you, then guess what? The pros don't just play Hold'em - they play everything! That's how you become a good poker player. The Big Game at the Bellagio is a $4,000/8,000 Limit game that switches between several types of poker, because true poker greats love the game - all styles of the game!

So, what styles of poker should you learn? Listed are what I consider my Big Five, the games easiest to get a game in, with the most important game to learn (in my opinion) listed first:

1. Texas Hold'em. It's still the most popular game out there, and it's the one you should learn first, because you can get a game anywhere. It's the best place to start. Just remember to learn to play in all three of the major Limit structures; Fixed Limit, Pot Limit & No-Limit are all popular versions and are played very differently.

2. Seven-Card Stud.The most popular of the Stud games, 7-Stud is usually a Fixed Limit game. 7-Stud can be played a number of ways, but the three most popular are 7-Stud High, 7-Stud Hi/Lo (8 or better), & Razz (Lowball). With so much variety, and more betting rounds, it's a very profitable game and one you will learn a lot from.

3. Omaha. A very popular Community Card game that is awesome played Hi/Lo, as well as making an excellent Pot Limit game. Omaha will teach you a lot about pot odds and drawing hands.

4. Five-Card Draw. If for no other reason than to have a good home game where everybody knows the rules. Learn how to play it Limit, Pot & No-Limit, and clean up on your mates!

5. Triple Draw. This game is becoming very popular in the States nowadays because of the huge pot sizes. It's a Lowball version of 5-Draw played either Deuce to Seven or Ace to Five. A lot of mixed games features some form of Triple Draw. Learn it.

Speaking of mixed games, it's an ever-increasing trend at a big tournament series to run a H.O.R.S.E. tournament. For the uninitiated, H.O.R.S.E. is a mixed game where play cycles between Texas Hold'em, Omaha Eight-or-better, Razz, Seven-Card Stud High and Seven-Card Stud Eight-or-better. There's a lot of money to be had in these tournaments, and there's no reason why you can't have it, if you learn how to win at every game.

Finally, you have to learn other versions of poker to keep the game interesting. There's nothing worse than playing online and realising that you're bored of Hold'em, but you're winning and you don't want to stop! That's when, if you're poker savvy, you'll be able to jump on the 7-Stud tables and continue your good form. Playing different styles will make you more passionate and interested in poker as a multi-dimensional masterpiece.

So learn as many variations of poker as possible. You'll become a much diverse player, able to get a game wherever you go. My budding students will be learning all of these, and they've never played in their life. What's your excuse?

A man walks into a bar and says...

...there's no better place to size someone up than at a card table.

...courtesy and etiquette should be used when it's appropriate, which is whenever you want something for nothing.

...if you live in Melbourne, every year you'll meet 150 people who could do with a punch to the face right there and then.

...you'll also meet 300 people a year with whom you should have sex right there and then.

...anything can be dangerous, because anyone can be dangerous... and stupid.

...the good ol' days are, in any given point in modern history, 20-50 years ago. In March 2058, the good ol' days will be June 2057.

...rock will never be the same, and so now it's not rock.

...if I was a shape, I'd be a heptagon.

...whenever you walk into a room, head straight for the most interesting thing in the room, and use it for its intended purpose.

...a game of Monopoly, played among friends, and also among alcohol, will make everybody present hate Monopoly.

...if I had to make a concept album about a colour, I'd use periwinkle blue.

...there's never enough time to get something done the way you want it done, and it pisses you off.

...given enough rope, any man will hang himself.

...keeping your enemies closer than your friends makes you safe, but so paranoid that you can't enjoy being safe.

...better to be powerful and happy than weak and sad.

...St. Patrick's Day should be a Public Holiday. National "Sorry" Day should be a Public Holiday as well, but we should move it to August 20th, so that we get a break between June and November.

...god died about 50 years ago, when we stopped needing him.

...the only safe way to invest your money is to learn to play Poker.

...all great philosophical discussions were fueled by copious amounts of drugs.

If you could get away with it...

...what wouldn't you do? Yesterday there was another public shooting in the U.S.: a 60-year old bloke in Florida shot up a Wendy's, killed a fireman, and then turned the gun on himself.

Now, think of this not as a "senseless tragedy", but for what it is: a murder-suicide. I've found myself interested more and more in these seemingly random shootings in the States, particularly those that end in shooter suicide. As a fatalist, and a nihilist, I don't think there's anything waiting for us at the end of our lives.* With that in mind, there's no cosmic consequence for the actions we take.

Now consider suicide. If I decided that I wanted to die, that I was done here and I'm finished up, what would prevent me from doing whatever I wanted before I kicked off? This is the context I approach these recent shootings in. People who want to die, and going out with, dare I say it, a bang!

Think about it: if you could get away with it, what wouldn't you do? Odds are if you think about it - really think about it - you'll probably think of quite a few things you'd like to do. Am I suggesting that you go out and do them? Of course not; I have no intention of killing myself, and so the things I say come with consequences. However, if I was done with living, and there was no way of being held accountable...

Most people I've spoken to, if they have a good, objective look at the situation, agree that there's a lot they would do if they knew they'd get away with it. Honestly, I don't know what I'd do if I could do whatever I wanted. But if you ever read a story about a man completely fucked up on equal parts cocaine, skunk weed and acid, who stole a Lamborghini, ran over pedestrians in the middle of Melbourne at 150kph and drove the fucker off a jetty in Docklands before shooting himself in the head, spare a thought for the dearly departed who's blog you'll never read again.

*If you think I'm wrong, that's fine. Believe what you want. But since you can't prove it, don't email me.

Breathe on plants. It'll save the world.

According to climate change expert and concerned citizen Kevin Rudd, the next big technique in the fight against "global warming" - that thing Al Gore made up to stay powerful; that world crisis that all Australians are so deeply concerned with unless there's something better going like saying "sorry" or rising interest rates - is to take atmospheric carbon and... wait for it... stick it in the ground!

According to the Carbon Coalition Against Global Warming, increasing the amount of stable carbon in soil can retain more water, reduce silting, increase crop production and remove carbon from the atmosphere. The idea behind this is that deep-rooted plants will suck carbon dioxide from the air to use in photosynthesis, and organic carbon will accumulate as humus. End result: carbon is trapped underground, the world chills out a little, and water is retained where it's needed.

Great idea. These people are gonna be fucking loaded.

I don't really care about climate change. The climate will change forever, because that's what the climate does. Excess carbon dioxide will sink into the increasing ocean, the greenhouse effect will be nulified by extreme rainfall, we'll cool down again in about 2,000 years or so, and then we'll go into an Ice Age, and the party in Government will be replaced by a new party that has its finger on the "global cooling" pulse. This happens, and we've not been around long enough to get used to it. Sit and watch; Nature will prove to be a far more resilient and effective balancer than mankind.

No, what we should be praising these people for is a unique way to get rich. The Carbon Coalition is, according to their own blog, "an alliance of farmers, scientists, extension officers and soils enthusiasts who believe the farmer should be rewarded for building carbon levels in the soil. " If I were a scientist, wondering from where my next grant was to come, I'd probably have my hand in the cookie jar as well. I'm sure that there are a lot of farmers who already cultivate deep rooted plants because of the water retention that goes so far to keep their livestock healthy (and more valuable.) Why not ask for a Government grant to do so? Indeed, this is an excellent example of taking a simple concept like fear, injecting a little hope, and watching the Teeming Masses dive headfirst into agreement like lemmings.

As you've probably gathered, I love shit like this, because it reminds me that no matter what else I do while I'm Waiting for the Big Sleep, I can always get rich off of stupid people in large groups.